


The Kids Aren't Alright

by areyoureddiekids



Category: IT (2017)
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, Zombies, and losers club friendship ofc, and lots of gay, gross zombies, just zombies, ooooh lordy above the gay
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-09
Updated: 2017-12-27
Packaged: 2019-02-12 15:58:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12962964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/areyoureddiekids/pseuds/areyoureddiekids
Summary: Richie is already having a pretty shitty day. First, he get’s a C- on his favourite subject, Science. Second, Bev totally called him out for being a giant douche to Eddie that morning. Three, he was totally being a douche to Eddie, because Eddie was making freaking googly eyes at some Senior dude. What’s the last thing needs?The Apocalypse, that’s what.





	1. Chapter One: Part One: Zombies, Gay Crushes, and Panic Attacks - Oh, My!

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! This is my new Reddie fic,and I hope you all like. I post lots of things to my Tumblr, too, some come follow me at floralreddie. Thanks and enjoy!

Richie is already having a pretty shitty day. First, he get’s a C- on his favourite subject, Science. Second, Bev totally called him out for being a giant douche to Eddie that morning. Three, he was totally being a douche to Eddie, because Eddie was making freaking googly eyes at some Senior dude. What’s the last thing needs?

The Apocalypse, that’s what.

He’s hardly in the wrong for being in such a shitty mood. When Ben first saw Bev flirt with some girl at that party six months ago, he’d been pretty fucking heart-broken and had snapped drunkenly at everyone all night. A very odd thing for sweet as pie Ben to do, for sure. Because of that, Richie knew Ben couldn’t be a dick for him for how he had snapped at Eddie that morning.

That wasn’t disregarding the fact that everyone else had sent him sour looks as Eddie stormed down the hallways of Derry High School and away from them.

Shit, he can’t even remember what he had said. Something about Eddie being a fucking Princess, or something. Eddie wasn’t super pissed, anyway. He only got funny about that kind of thing since he came out as gay last year.

And Richie, considering his big ol’ bi crush on his best friend, had of course been fucking elated at the news. Still, that didn’t mean he had told Eddie. Oh, fuck no. Richie was pretty straight forward about a lot of things, but telling Eddie Kaspbrak about his gooey, gross feelings was not one of them. 

He was Richie Tozier, for fucks sake. 

Plus…College was just around the corner. Whilst Richie was going to Cali (and as far away from his shitty parents as he could), Eddie was going to Columbia (so fucking far away). Bill, the braniac, was going to Stanford, and Stan to Brown, Ben to Chicago, Bev to San Fran, and Mike was staying in Derry.

On top of all of that shit, Richie had gotten his first C- in three years on some Assignment in Biology, and he was not fucking happy.

He knew his friends had clocked his shitty mood. They were in their second period of the day, English, and he, Bev, Bill, Stan and Mike, and Bev and Mike kept casting him curious glances as he buried his head in his folded arms and watched through thick rimmed glasses as their teacher rambled on about the construction of sentences.

It was then, in the bored silence of the class room, as Bev watched Richie with a disappointed, knowing look, and Bill and Stan took notes dutifully at the other end of the classroom, and Mike gazed at the teacher with a somewhat bland expression…That’s when Gretta Keene sees it.

She screams, and Richie’s heart nearly fucking falls out of his butt. He had been deep in a daydream, something involving the upcoming School Dance, and whether Eddie would ask any of the guys in their Grade. It may be Derry, but it was 2017 and some people in the Town were actually willing to announce their sexuality. 

The thought of Eddie going with anyone else had Richie cheeks going pink and his eyes narrowing at the poor, defenceless tin bin sitting in the corner of the room, behind Mrs Lay.

Then Gretta screams, and everyone jumps out of their skin. 

‘There’s someone…someone being attacked on the grass!’ she yells, scrambling from her sat by the window, just in front of Stan and Bill, and going to press her nose up against the glance. Richie turns, bored, and catches Bev’s eye. As the rest of the class scramble, ignoring Mrs Lay’s instructions to sit down, Bev cocks a slow brown at Richie and shrugs.

To rows behind them, Mike jostles and sits up right, rising from his seat as the girl next to him scrambles to have a look out of the window. Quickly, it seems that everyone else has the same idea.

Bill and Stan, who had been swept into the crowd, go to also have a look as gasps and yells echo throughout the classroom Even Mrs Lay, who pushes herself between a few students and a cupboard, draws a slow hand to her mouth and jolts, as if torn between going to get help and watching whatever was happening.

It is then that Richie starts to grow worried, and it is then that Bev grasps the sleeve of his denim jacket, her red head turned toward the window and away from Richie.

Bev and Richie, still sitting in their seats along with three other students, watch the two tall boys, Bill an Stan, as they wrench themselves from the small crowd, faces pale and eyes wide. Stan stumbles beside Bill, his tight fitting navy jumper still someone loose against his lanky form, and reaches Bev and Richie before Bill.

‘We need to go. Now,’ Stan says, green eyes wide and cheeks flushed red with panic. Richie stares at him, somehow wondering if this is some kind of joke. It was rare to see Stan so panicked about anything, and the Trashmouth is actually kinda worried for a second.

‘What the fuck is going on Big Bill?’ Richie asks, as the Head of the Lacrosse Team reaches them, somehow with his and Stan’s backpacks in his hands. He shoves Stan’s clean backpack to him, before turning to Bev.

‘We n-need to go,’ he says, and that’s that. Mike is there, then, worried and pale and gazing over at the crowd.

Richie and Bev stand easily, eyebrows drawn in and half trying to look what the others crowded around the window could see. There are more gasps; more surprised yells. Bev grabs at Richie’s.

‘What the fuck is going on?’ Richie snaps, because he’s kind of freaked out now. ‘What the fuck was going on outside the window?’

They’re in the hallway now, as Bill and Stan distractedly push Mike, Richie and Bev out of the classroom. ‘Guys!’ Mike snaps, tall and strong, as he rounds on Bill and Stan. ‘You’ve got to give us something here!’

There’s a scream somewhere, and it echos around the building.

‘What the hell was that?’ Bev breathes, blue eyes wide as he grasps her shiny, metallic back pack and throws it over her shoulders. She’s only wearing her floral dress and, despite the summer heat, she suddenly looks cold. ‘What did you see?’

It happens simultaneously, but suddenly all of the students from their classroom are piling out of the room, and pushing the group of five to the side, and then classrooms from either side of the corridor are bursting open as students pour out.

Everyone seems panicked, but no one quite seems to know why.

‘We n-need to g-get to my t-truck!’ Bill says, blue eyes flashing. Richie squints, because Bill’s stutter only gets this bad when he’s nervous or scared. Students push past them, and Richie sees Gretta Keene with tears rolling down her cheeks as her friends tug her toward the school exit, the door just meters away from them.

‘Bill!’ Mike snaps, and Bev turns to stare at him wide-eyed, as Stan jumps. Mike did not snap. ‘Dude - what did you see?’

Stan answers, and amongst the confused shouts as students hurry to talk to each other, phones out (and some cover their mouths in shock as they scroll), he says, ‘It looked like…people. Three of them. They were-’

‘They were eating some-someone,’ Bill answers flatly. ‘We need to find Eddie and Ben’.

It’s like the Gates to Hell open, then. 

Richie is looking at Bev, head turned toward hers and dark browns drawn together as he hikes his glasses up in nose. Bev, who is his best friend beside Eddie, his partner in crime, looks equally as horrified as she looks to him. 

Then there is a long, drawn out scream.

There is a pause, almost as if a collective breath is drawn, as students turn. It is silence, so strong and so poignant that it seemed to last so much longer than all of six seconds.

Then people start running past the five of them, screams on their tongues as more and more people see what they are not seeing,and the crowd parts, and Richie’s stomach turns to mush as he says Gretta Keene fall to the floor, her arm bloody…

And it’s human, Richie thinks, the thing that bit her. But it can’t be. It’s standing in the now open school entrance, back hunched as Gretta’s friends scream around her. It’s a woman, Richie knows, with scraggly pale blonde hair, white eyes, and sagging, pale skin that makes it looks as if she’s a rotting corpse. Her mouth is stained with Gretta’s blood.

Richie knows her. She works at the Grocery Store. Her name is Amy.

Then, from behind it, come two more. They walk slowly, but with an almost fast grace. They stagger, leer, snap their teeth. 

He sees only a sliver of them grabbing onto Gretta’s friends, before the crowd surging forward blurs his view, and Bev is grabbing onto his arm. ‘Come on!’ she screams, yanking him with her as Mike, Bill and Stan take the lead, pushing through the crowd.

Richie is scared…Richie is freaked the fuck out.

No one seems to give a shit about personal space as students shove and elbow each other out of the way, but all Richie sees is the auburn of Bill’s hair as he follows him like a beacon, knowing full well that he couldn’t leave his friends, whatever the fuck was happening.

Then his heart falls out of his butt because…Eddie.

They round a corner as Mike drags them to the side, shouting something about the West Entrance as they break free from the crowd and breath heavily, their feet slamming against the floor as they run. 

‘Wait!’ Richie yells, stumbling to a stop and nearly tripping over his dirty chucks. ‘Eddie,’ he pants, shoving his glasses up the bridge of his nose. ‘And Ben!’

Bev turns from staring at him, to whirl to look over at the others. Bill, in his plaid shirt and ripped blue jeans, draws a hand over his mouth and nods without pause. 

Richie is scrambling for his cracked iPhone without pause. A small crowd of people stumbles past them. ‘Shit! Mike swears, gaze horrified as he stares at something behind Richie. Richie turns, struck and with the phone held to his face, as he watches a girl he knows from the year below fall heavily to the floor as he student surge forward, though there is less of them now.

A bloody, groaning body falls on top of her, lean forward, and takes a alrge chunk out of the girls neck.

She screams.

‘Holy shit!’ Stan yells.

‘In here!’ Bev pants, pushing open the classroom door behind Bill and holding it open. ‘Come on!’

They do, all of them, and she slams it shut behind her. The classroom is empty, minus the scattered chairs and the one, singular bloody hand-print on the outside of the window.

‘What the fuck is going on…’ Bev murmurs, leaning heavily against the door with her chest heaving. She stumbles forward and grabs Mike’s supporting arm with a grateful look.

But Richie is to preoccupied with the fact that Eddie’s phone is going straight to voicemail.

‘Hi! You’ve reached Eddie Kaspbrak-!’

‘No! He’s not answering!’ Richie snaps, and Stan jumps. Bill, without pause, surges over to the window of the classroom and gazes out of it. 

As Richie swears, Bill states, ‘There are people run-running. Shit…I can see…there’s more p-people getting attacked. Jesus…what the f-fuck…’ Mike goes over to stand by him, and Richie watches as his shoulders stiffen and his jaw tightens.

Bev collapses onto one of the desks. Stan stands stock still, fists clenched and gaze on the floor.

‘Hey!’ Richie snaps. ‘Did anyone fucking hear me? Eddie isn’t answering!’ The others whirl to look at him, eyes wide. ‘He and Ben were in fucking… fuckin’ Art, right?’

‘Try Ben,’ Bev supplies.

‘They’re okay,’ Bill says, turned away from the window now, but for a moment it sounds as if he is reassuring himself, not them.

‘I fucking know,’ Richie snaps, before finding Ben’s number on his phone and pressing call. He cannot, for even a moment, consider the possibility of losing his friends to whatever the fuck was happening. Losing Eddie…the thought was not a notion he could even process. 

After three rings, Ben answers.

‘Oh, thank God!’ Ben breathes down the phone.

‘Ben!’ Richie yells, and the others sag in relief around the room. ‘Dude, where the fuck are you?!’

‘We-we stayed in the classroom when everyone else ran!’ Ben says, and he sounds quiet and panicked. ‘Annie Summers came in and we locked the door…and she was…I don’t know. Hurt. But she changed…turned into something crazy, Rich. She’s still in here. We locked ourselves in the supply cupboard’.

He lets the information process, nodding and breathing hard. Then he asks, heart beating and palms wet, ‘Is Eddie with you?’

He nearly fucking cries when Ben stutters out a yes, and then there is a fumbling sound and the most wonderful noise Richie has heard in all his life.

Eddie.

‘You better come and get us, Rich,’ Eddie says, and his voice is breathless, but strong. He sounds shit-scared, Richie knows. He knows Eddie better than anyone. ‘I’m starting to get a little bit worried that I might die in an Art Supplies cupboard by a girl smaller than me’.

Richie nods, nerves shaking from the ends of his curly, dark hair to his grubby chucks. ‘I’m comin’, Ed’s,’ he assures over the phone. ‘Art room, right? I’m…we’re only five rooms down from you’.

Eddie breath hitches. ‘Hurry, Rich’.

Richie hangs up, turns to his waiting friends, with their wide eyes and scared expressions, and he breathes in deeply. ‘Art room,’ he says, as Bev stands and walks forward. Bill does, too, and then Stan and Mike. Soon, they’re all grouped together.

‘W-well,’ Bill says, jaw set and eyes hard. ‘Let’s go g-get them’.


	2. Chapter One: Part Two: Part One: Zombies, Gay Crushes, and Panic Attacks - Oh, My!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part two of chapter one! I hope you enjoy! Follow me on tumblr to get updates too. Its floralreddie.

‘Five rooms down,’ Bev nods, jaw tense and eyes hard. She doesn’t sound as brave as she looks, Richie notes. The red-heads fists were clenched, and she jumped at every yell that sounded from beyond the door.

Outside, the sound of hundreds of cars vacating the car park could be heard. Everyone seemed to be trying to get as far away from the school s they could.

‘Bill,’ Mike says, strong arms crossed across his chest as he gazed thoughtfully at the classroom door. He, out of all of them, was the one who held the strongest head. Richie felt like he was going to have a fucking heart attack (because what the fuck was going on?!), but he knew full fucking well that he had to focus on getting to Eddie and Ben. They all look to Mike.

‘Y-yeah?’ Bill asks. He’s standing close to Stan, the shorter of the two, and his auburn hair was tousled, and his blue eyes frightened. Richie knew Bill pretty fucking well, after being friends with him since they were four, and the look in Bill’s eyes said that he was shit scared, but he wasn’t going to acknowledge that fact until his friends were safe.

‘You’re going to have to go to your truck. Take someone with you - Stan?’ Bill begins to shake is head as Stan looks almost guilty and relieved at the prospect of leaving the High School and its confines. ‘Bill - I know you don’t want to leave us, man, but we need you to be waiting for us somewhere for when we run. And someone...someone could try and steal your truck-’

‘He’s right, dude,’ Richie cuts in, as Bev nods in agreement. He pushes his mass of curly hair back and shifts in his chucks. He just wants to get going - Eddie was waiting for him. He shoots a brown eyed gaze to Mike, then to Bev. ‘You guys up for that?’

Bev doesn’t even pause before nodding, her brown furrowed and her hands on her metallic back pack. ‘Let’s fucking do this,’ she mutters. She pauses, ignoring Bill’s helpless look at not being able to help as Mike instructs them where they should wait, and Richie watches her in interest.

He grins when she kicks at one of the rickety table legs with the hard toe of her black Docs, kicking it easily free and swooping down to pick it up. She turns to the boys with a flourish. ‘Weapons,’ she says breezily.

Bill and Stan grasp Richie, Bev and Mike’s shoulders before they slip into the hallway. There are a few students hiding round corners further don the corridor, but then run quickly when they see the five Losers (the Losers Club, some shitty nickname that they made up when they were kids and Bowers used to bother them) step out of the classroom. 

There was blood staining the floor outside the door, and Richie grimaces at the sight.

‘West exit,’ Mike nods, grabbing Bill’s hand. He nods, and Bill nods back. ‘Be safe,’ he says.

‘You, too,’ Bill and Stan say at the same time.

‘In a bit, Stanley, Billiam,’ Richie says, feigning that he isn’t shit fucking scared right now. ‘And try and find out what the fuck is happening, huh?’

Stan rolls his eyes, tugs on Bill’s plaid shirt, and then they are hurtling down the corridor away from the three of them, pieces of splintered wood from the classroom tables in their hands.

Richie watches them go, before sighing. ‘Let’s go save the damsels in distress, huh?’ he says, turning on his heel with a squeak of his shoes against the floor. 

Bev snorts, despite the situation. ‘Don’t let Eddie hear you call him that’.

They move quickly, their footsteps dull thuds in the odd quiet of the school. They pass one room, then another, then another. Bev hops over a puddle of messy blood, and Richie wonders what the fuck happened whilst they hid in that classroom.

Somewhere, a male scream rings through the silence, before cutting off suddenly.

‘C’mon,’ Mike mutters, head ducked and hands grasping the metal chair leg in his hands, turning away from the horrified stares of Richie and Bev.

Richie thinks bitterly that his biggest fucking problem today had been getting a shitty grade in Biology, and that Eddie was, once again, pissy with him. How fucking much did he want those simple problems back? A lot.

They reach the Art room quietly, and Bev’s shoulder is pressed so tightly to Richie as they walk, makeshift weapons in hand and backs crouched, that he’s half surprised he doesn’t topple the fuck over. She’s scared though, he can tell. 

And that scares the shit out of him, because Bev doesn’t get scared a lot.

He thanks fuck that they have Mike with them

He hopes to shit that Bill and Stan make it to the truck.

He prays to every fucking deity or God that might exist that they get to Eddie and Ben safely, and that whatever is waiting for them on the other side of the door doesn’t fucking kill them.

They pause for only a moment outside the door. Mike turns to them, brown gaze hard and dark skin shining with a thin sheen of sweat. There’s a question in his gaze, and Bev and Richie nod without pause in answer.

He turns, breathes in deeply, and clicks the door open with a quick flick of his wrist.

Richie’s heart is fucking hammering.

There’s a moment of quiet as they stare. Richie knows the girl. They all do. She’s Annie Summers. She’s in their grade. Richie had a crush on her when he was fourteen. Except...she doesn’t look like Annie anymore. Her red hair is a damp mess. Her once blue eyes are a milky, terrible white. Her skin, once pale and freckled, is now sagging and grey.

She looks dead.

She turns to them, mouth slightly agape as she staggers in the middle of the classroom, her arms limp at her side and one of her ankles bent at an odd angle. The summer dress she’s wearing is drenched in thick looking blood, and there was a gaping gash across one of her bare arms.

A bite mark.

She staggers toward them, steady and groaning, and Richie leaps forward. He’d seen the closed cupboard door, and the fact alone that Eddie was on the other side of said door seemed to make some kind fo adrenaline kick inside of him, like when mother push cars or some shit away from their babies prams.

Except he doesn’t think of Eddie as his kid, because that’s fucking gross and weird.

He doesn’t think about this being a girl he knows. All he thinks about is that she’s a monster, coming to hurt him. Eat him. So, he darts forward on his long legs, past Mike, and slams the sharp end of his shitty, wooden weapon against her shoulders as hard as he can.

She staggers, a rasping moan coming from her throat, and snarls at him, hands outstretched as she falls toward him.

He yells, and suddenly Bev is there. She slams her table leg against Monster-Annie’s head, and the thing dribbles out blood and saliva, and when Richie gets a whiff of her he nearly gags.

Mike joins them then, and suddenly they’re a circle of scared as shit teenagers beating the shit out of what Richie is 97% sure is a fucking zombie. 

‘The head!’ someone yells suddenly, and Richie’s heart leaps at the voice. ‘Jesus, don’t you guys watch any horror movies?!’

Bev wastes no time in kicking Monster-Annie with her boot, so hard that the thing falls to the floor with a groan and a clatter, legs and arms flailing. Bev moves quickly as Mike and Richie stumbles back, and before they knows what’s happening she drawing her arms up, sharpened table leg held high, before slamming it down hard against Annie Summers head.

It breaks through the skull, and the once-girl stops moving, groaning, and trying to eat them.

Richie whirls around as Bev chokes on a startled gasp and stumbles back, with thankfully Mike by her side to grab her arm and ask if she’s okay. All Richie can hear is the ringing in his ears of the voice that yelled for him, and he’s grinning when he sees Eddie and Ben standing outside the cupboard, pale and alive.

Eddie, with his pastel blue jumper and torn blue jeans, stares at Richie with a helpless expression on his pale face. His hair, usually perfectly styles, is a mess of straight brown strands. Beside him, Ben breathes heavily, his black button up shirt spattered with light spots of blood.

‘Oh, thank fuck,’ Richie breathes, as Eddie and Ben hurry over to them. He grabs at Eddie without thinking, dragging the smaller boy into a tight embrace as Eddie grunts.

Mike and Bev do the same with Ben, and Richie pulls away from Eddie, cheeks pink and chest tight. Eddie stares up at him, brown eyes glassy and cheeks flushed. 

‘Thanks for coming to get me, I guess,’ he says, and Richie wants to remind him that there was no world in which Richie would not come to Eddie when the other needed help.

Richie snorts. ‘Sure thing, Ed’s’.

‘Don’t-’ Eddie begins to snap.

Bev clears her throat, and Richie blinks as Eddie flushes. Turning away from his best friend, Richie grins at Ben and slaps him on the back. ‘Glad you’re not dead,’ Richie says.

Ben sighs. ‘Thanks, Rich’.

‘Bill and Stan are waiting at the truck,’ Bev states breathlessly. She looks worse than before, her hair a mess and a smudge of red on her cheek. Her hands, Richie sees, were shaking. ‘We need to get to them - now’.

They nod, agree, and then they’re hurrying into the corridor and toward the West Exit.

‘What the fuckin’ hell is happening?’ Eddie asks, just as they round a corner, grouped tightly together. Richie stays close to him, weapon raised. 

‘Fuck knows,’ Richie mutters in the quiet. There weren’t any shouts, like before. It seemed most people had already left the school in terror. ‘The end of the world, apparently’.

‘Figures,’ Ben murmurs. 

Mike continues to lead, and they all nearly slam into each other as he holds up his hand, coming to an abrupt stop. Richie cranes his neck to see what he had seen, his free hand unconsciously hovering near Eddie’s arm, and his stomach turns when he sees two figures hunched over a bloody, half-eaten corpse of one of the Math teachers.

The sounds of slurping, groaning, and crunching fill the air.

Eddie gags, and Bev chokes on a sob.

‘We’re going to have to run,’ Mike murmurs, eyes on the scene before them. At the other end of the corridor was the Exit.

Richie pushes his glasses up his nose, before nodding. It doesn’t take long for the others to agree, too.

‘Give me your stick,’ Eddie says to Richie, voice a whisper.

‘What?’ Richie snaps. ‘No. And it’s not a fucking stick-’

‘I’ll be better with it. You didn’t even know to aim for the head-’

‘Oh my God, you’re fucking welcome-’

‘Oh, we literally do not have time for this,’ Mike snaps with an eye roll, as Ben stares in shock at the fact that Richie and Eddie could still manage to argue now, of all times. 

‘Agreed,’ Bev breathes. ‘On three, we run. One, two, three!’

They hurtle forward, feet squeaking against the floor and hearts hammering. They’re only a few steps away from the things when they look up, blood pouring from their gaping mouths and their hands buried in the teachers stomach, intestines in hand.

‘Fuck!’ Richie swears, grabbing Eddie and yanking him forward faster. ‘Go, go, go!’

They slip past the zombie-fied students, horrified as one of them stumbles to its feet and staggered and slips through the gushing blood to grab at the five of them. Ben yells, just as Mike aims a hard kick to the zombie without even pausing, and Bev whoops.

‘Holy shit, Hanlon!’

They reach the door in record timing, heart hammering and chests heaving as they slam the door open and break into the summer hear and the blazing sunlight.

People are running. Cars were whizzing down the road. Zombies staggers about the grass, desperate to reach anything to eat.

The truck sits in front of the pavement, and Bill hands his head out of the window as he starts to the engine. ‘Come on!’ he yells, as a helicopter zooms over head. ‘Run!’

They do, and somehow Richie’s hand ends up slipped into Eddie as they stagger over the bloody grass toward Bill’s truck, all of them half-relieved with the knowledge that it was the seven of them together.

It made facing whatever the fuck was happening just that little bit easier.


	3. Six Stops

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry it took so long! i've added this to my tumblr also, gimme a follow at floralreddie!

Richie might be fucking sick, and Richie is never sick. He’s downed half a bottle of cheap ass vodka in half an hour and still not puked.

He, Bev, Eddie, and Mike are sitting in the cargo bed of the truck, huddles into the middle with their arms and legs far away from the sides. Bill, who is normal anal as shit about how fats he drives, is whizzing down the suburban street of Derry with Stan and Ben in the front with him.

Around them, it’s fucking anarchy.

People are hurling things into their cars and pulling quickly into the road. Others are fighting off the deranged, hungry-for-human-flesh people that seemed to be, Richie had deduced, coming back from the fucking dead through bites.

Fucking zombies. Figures.

‘What the fuck,’ Eddie quivers out, and Richie throws an arm around his shoulders without a moments pause. Bev, who sits next to him, is huddled between his long legs, and Mike sits in front of Eddie, gaze hard as he stares out at the streets passing by quickly. ‘What the fuck?!’

Richie looks away when he sees a woman trip out of her house and fall. She is quickly followed by a ravenous looking child.

‘The News…’ Bev says, and she’s looking closely at her cracked phone, balanced between her painted finger nails. She taps at the screen, brown drawn together as she huddles closer to Richie. ‘It says it’s happening everywhere. All over the world’.

‘Fuck…’Richie breathes, pushing his glasses up his nose with his index finger. He taps on the glass divider between himself and the three sitting in the truck. Around them, the world wails. ‘Go via all our houses,’ Richie says, as Ben yanks it open and stares at him, face pale and eyes wide. ‘This shit is happening everywhere. We gotta get somewhere safe’.

Ben tells Bill and Bill nods, knuckles white against the steering wheel. Richie feels Eddie shudder as he turns back around. ‘They’re gonna go via all our houses-’

‘Don’t bother going past mine,’ Bev grumbles. ‘I don’t need to know what’s happened to him’.

Ben stares at her through the divider, before hurriedly relaying the message to Bill. Mike turns away from the road and pats Bev’s bent knees, his gaze serious. Even Richie, who is pretty sure he hates his parents, can’t imagine not caring if they were dead or not.

But he also knows that Bev’s dad calls her Bevvie, that he hates her hanging out with the boys, and that his touches linger far too long. 

‘You sure about that, Bev?’ Mike asks, voice low. 

Bev leans back against Richie, her gaze sombre. ‘I’m sure-’ She’s cut off by a sudden jerking and a screech of tires, and Bill’s loud yell from inside the truck. They all swear and grab at each other as the truck hurtles to the side, and Richie holds onto Eddie all the tighter.

Richie sees quickly what caused the sudden stop. Another car had hurtled out of the junction to their left. The man in the front, who Richie recognises at Gretta Keenes father, slams his windscreen and yells at Bill.

Richie also doesn’t miss the three bloody bodies wandering toward them, leaving behind the half-eaten corpse on the pavement.

‘Fucking drive, Bill!’ Bev screeches.

He does, and they all slide down dirty bay of the truck, leaving behind the groaning, hungry corpses. That was what they were, right? Just bodies. Hungry bodies and not people. That’s hat all the films said. 

They drive via Richie’s first, the closest house, and find a half open doorway with what looks to be a foot sticking out onto the porch.

Richie nods, stomach rolling as Eddie stares at the side of his head and Stan turns in his seat, green eyes watchful. ‘That’s all I need to know,’ he murmurs, and then Bill is stepping on the gas and off they go again. Eddie, with a quiet look and a prod to Richie’s shoulder, searches Richie’s gaze before leaning his forehead quietly against Richie’s chest.

Such an action would have once been followed with blushes from both parties, and pointed look from Bev, but in that moment Richie’s pretty sure there’s bigger things to worry about.

Next is Stan’s, and the story is much the same. The Synagogue doors are wide open, leaving a trail of dead bodies to wander out into the open. Stan chokes on a sob when he sees his father amongst the masses, his hand flying to his mouth. Ben reaches for his friend from his place in the seat of the truck, his arm looping around Stan’s shoulders as the latter buries his face in his hands and sits there, still.

Richie has to give fucking kudos to Bill, because he drives on, weaving through bodies and missing cars that are driving away from the mess of Derry. Ben murmurs, as they ask about his family, that they were away for the weekend, gone to New Hampshire for their anniversary. 

‘They didn’t answer their phone when I called earlier, in the arts room,’ he mutters, and no one quite knows what to say to that.

Eddie’s house is the worst, Richie knows. It’s near that creepy as shit Neibolt House, which looks horrible enough given the real life horror movie they were living. It’s only made so entirely worse by the fact that Eddie’s mother stands on the porch of the house, blood on her neck and chest, and flabby legs carrying her slowly down the steps and onto the grass.

Bill pauses in front of the house as Eddie leans over the edge of the truck and stares. This part of ton was quieter, further away from the mess of the centre. Eddie’s neighbours don’t even seem to be home at all. 

Still, Richie doesn’t know what to do. No one does. They all just stare, silent, at the sad and hopeless sight of Mrs Kaspbrak stumbling onto the grass, eyes wide and chubby had reaching forward for the son she no longer recognised. 

Now, Richie was never a fan of Eddie’s mother. She was overprotective and unhinged as shit, and hated the fact that her son was gay. Richie remembers Eddie crawling through his window whilst his parents were downstairs, probably drunk, and crying into Richie’s chest for hours into the night after Mrs Kaspbrak rejected her son. Not only that, but she was the fucking reason Eddie suffered from panic attacks and hated anything fucking dirty or wrong.

But, in that moment, Richie pushes that aside when he hears the tell-tale sign of Eddie’s breath catching in his throat. The small, dark haired boy lurches back, hand flying blindly to grab at the sleeve of Richie’s denim jacket as he heaves in deep breaths. 

Richie stares at him, mouth agape and words caught in his throat.

‘Drive, Bill!’ Mike yells.

He does, and Richie grapples for Eddie, cupping his jaw and turning him roughly away from the scene as they leave it. Mrs Kaspbrak stumbles on a broken ankle, mouth agape and eyes a glassy white. ‘I know, Ed’s,’ Richie says loudly over the sound of sirens and the trucks engine, as Eddie’s brown eyes fill with tears and he stares, panicked, and breathes harshly through his nose and mouth. ‘I’m sorry, Ed’s. I really fuckin’ am’.

And he is. Eddie’s upset. Richie hates that.

They drive, and Richie drags Eddie closer to him, his arm tight around Eddie’s form. He knows that Eddie is trying really fucking hard to keep the sobs at bay, but he feels his body jolt and convulse every few moments. Bev, who sits in front of him, has her legs drawn to her chest, her red hair the only thing visible as she buries her head between her knees.

Mike had pushed himself next to Richie, head stuck through the divide in the glass as he gazed out of the front window, murmuring low words to Ben.

Bill’s road, the nicest out of the seven of them, is quiet. There is one car driving quickly down the road, the boot nearly springing open because it is so filled with whatever the family had grabbed from their house. Richie watches them as they pass, noting the hard stares of the mother driving as she nods to the teenagers.

All of the houses seem quiet; all the curtains drawn. Richie wonders if its because most of the parents were at work and the kids at school. He wonders if some people even know what was happening further into town.

Bill’s pulls up quietly outside of his house.The door is closed. The windows shut despite the summer warmth. His dads car isn’t there. They all lean to look at it, and Eddie sniffles in Richie’s arm and looks cautiously over his shoulder. Slowly, Bev lifts her head from her knees and stares with bloodshot eyes.

‘Didn’t you say Georgie was off sick with your mom today?’ Stan croaks, voice raspy and tired. Richie pushes up his glasses, his fingers digging into Eddie’s arm.

Bill clears his throat. ‘Stomach bug’.

Richie thinks that might be a good thing. Maybe it wasn’t whatever the fuck was turning people into flesh eating zombies. Maybe it was a typical, average. everyday sickness. 

Maybe.

It is then that the door bangs open, and Bev flings herself back into the back wall of the truck, her gasping scream slicing through the once quiet of the street. ‘Jesus fuck!’ she yells, just as Stan yells and Bill…Bill is unbuckling his seat-belt with hurried, loud fingers and he is yelling, because Georgie is there, screaming, as Sharon Denbrough attempts to drag her son back into her house.

And her eyes…her eyes are a soul-less white.

Richie’s acting before he’s had time to process what the fuck is even happening. 

He unlatches himself from Eddie, ignoring the hands that scramble at his jacket as he flings himself over the side of the truck and lands clumsily on his feet. A sharp pain slices through his bones, but he ignores it, only pausing to kick the door shut that Bill was hastily trying to open.

‘Need you to drive off quickly!’ Richie shouts, as Bill stares hopelessly at him through the window with terrified blue eyes.

‘Richie, no!’

‘Richie!’

And Eddie…Eddie’s shout is the loudest of them all. ‘You fucking idiot!’

Hm…nice to know his friends appreciate the shit he does for them. He runs across the neatly cut lawn, brown eyes latched only onto the screaming, crying, and snotty Georgie Denbrough. He’d known the kid for most of his eleven years, and fuck no was he going to let Bill’s little bro die.

He does the first thing that comes to mind the moment he meets the struggling pair in the doorway to the Denbrough house. He reaches for Georgie’s free arm, lurches his arm back, and punches Bill’s zombie mom straight in the face.

It fucking hurts, but it does the trick. Sharon stumbles back, a long and drawn out moan coming from her drooling mouth. Her eyes, white and dead, fly to Richie’s face as her pale fingers unlatch from her youngest sons arm. Her face, already sagging and grey, contorts as she finds her new target.

‘Go to Bill, dude!’ Richie grunts, tugging Georgie back and practically throwing the kid in the direction of the truck. He turns only briefly to push the crying child, who stares for only a second at Richie, and then to his mother. ‘Go, I’m fine-!’ But then, as he sees Bev lean over the side of the truck and shout for Georgie, arms spread, he feels cold hands wrap around his hand and tug.

Richie’s about 80% sure what happens next, but he knows that Georgie goes running to the still turned on truck, his sobs echoing as Bev pulls him up, her scared yells only for Richie.

He whirls around to stare at Sharon Denbrough, a woman who was admittedly sometimes absent, but always welcomed Richie into her home. He almost feels bad about punching her. 

In that moment, with her clawed hands latching onto him and her contorted mouth rasping out harsh breaths as her jaw snaps, almost like a hungry animals, Richie understands how fully these fucking monsters had no remnants of the people they used to be in them.

He thinks he hears the soft thud of someone hitting the pavement behind him, as he attempts to kick at Mrs Denbrough’s legs and punch away her freakisly strong fingers that grasp at him. He’s not sure though.

What he does hear is Eddie’s vehement proclamation of, ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Denbrough, but get the fuck off of him’, following by the smaller boys bod hurling forward and fucking rugby tackling the groaning undead woman into the door frame.

‘Richie, let’s go!’ And Richie’s in fucking awe (and only a tiny bit turned on) as Eddie grabs onto his hand and yanks him forward, hair a mess and cheeks flushed, and before Richie knows it they’re piling into the back of the truck, and Georgie is sitting on Ben’s lap, and they’re driving away from the mess, the horror, that was Derry.

It’s quiet for only a moment (aside from Georgie’s quiet sobs), as Richie sits with Eddie staring at him, and Bev curled against Mike, and Richie’s chest is heaving and his glasses askew, before Bill is saying, ‘Thank you, Rich,’ in a soft voice.

Richie can only throw him the thumbs up in the rear-view mirror, still breathless.

‘To you now, Mike?’ Ben asks from the front, as they turn sharply around the corner and pass a car, still smoking, having crashed into a nearby tree. Something was trying to claw its way out of the mess, all burnt and grey skin.

‘Don’t look, Georgie,’ Bill says sharply. Richie unconsciously grabs for Eddie, still staring forward as they drive, now past the fields just outside the town. 

‘We got guns at the farm,’ Mike nods, strong arm holding Bev in place. Richie had never seen her like this, so fucking scared and quiet. ‘It’s far enough away that it should be safe…I hope’.

They lull into a quiet after that. Sirens sounds in the distance, and screams echo through the streets that they leave behind. Richie turns only when Eddie reaches a shaking hand forward to set his glasses straight on his long nose. Richie turns to him, squinting against the sun.

Eddie looks up at him, shoulders hunched as they lean against the wall of the truck, and his eyes are narrowed in an annoyed way that Richie is familiar with. ‘Don’t ever,’ Eddie murmurs lowly, knees drawn to his chest as Richie spiders a hand across his back and tugs Eddie closer to him. It wasn’t an odd occurrence, for them to be so touchy. ‘Do that to me again’.

Richie forces a smile onto his face, because that’s the only thing he can do to make himself feel better. ‘But, Ed’s,’ Richie counters lowly, as Eddie’s dark eyes narrow even further. ‘I like seeing you get a little fiery’.


	4. The Hanlon Farm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yo yo yo, i’m glad you all liked the introduction of georgie! also check out the sickkk moodboard that the amazing @theliteraltrash did for this fic!! it's on my blog, just ask me if you can't find it! find me at floralreddie.

It doesn’t take long for Georgie to clamber from Ben’s lap and onto Stan’s. He’s a tall kid, for just eleven, but Stan doesn’t seem to give a shit as Bill’s little brother curls against Stan’s lanky limbs and sniffs into Stan’s pristine sweater.

Stan, still quiet and pale, just pats Georgie’s sandy brown hair and stares ahead at the road.

They talk only of what to do when they get to the farm. Mike admits, quietly, that his Grandfather had spoken of venturing into town for oil. Richie watches closely as Mike bows his head, his brow furrowed, and Bev touches his knee with a shaking hand.

They all know what that means.

The roads are quiet on the way to the farm. Only a few cars whizz past them. Twice, a helicopter whizzes ahead.

Richie wonders what the fuck the bigger towns in Maine are like.

Slowly, Bev begins to pull out of her shocked state. She moves to Mike’s place near the glass divider and mutters over Ben’s head to Bill. She tells him that they should get to Mike’s farm quickly. That they should hide the truck. She points to potholes quickly, insisting they needed to keep the truck intact.

Ben says nothing, whereas Bill, still in shock, just nods and hums to Bev’s rambling. Richie kind of guesses it’s Bev’s way of dealing. She was a carer, that was her thing. 

The moment they pull up at the farm, they’re all hurrying to get out of the truck and onto the soft dirt outside Mike’s rickety looking farmhouse. Mike comments quickly that his Gramps his gone, because so is the car. 

Ben hops from the front seat of the car as Mike says this, and Richie reaches for Mike with a solid grip to the broad boys shoulder and a, ‘Sorry, dude’.

Mike looks nothing short of devastated. 

They stand for a just a moment, staring at the house. Bill drags Georgie into a hug, as the youngest of them all chokes on a sob and tumbles into his brothers chest. Stan watches the scene with his mouth pressed into a thin line. Bev moves toward Mike, low murmurs on her tongue as she points to the barn. Ben collapses onto the ground, before burying his hands into his hair and staring hard at the ground.

Richie latches himself to Eddie’s side, his mouth dry and his shoulder pressed close to Eddie’s.

‘This is really happening,’ Eddie says lowly, as the others deal with this moment of rest any way they wish. ‘This…this is like a fucking movie, Rich’. Richie turns, just as Eddie looks stiffly up at him, cheeks still wet and eyes glassy. ‘This is fucked’.

Richie actually cracks a smile at that. ‘I couldn’t have said it better myself, Ed’s’. He shrugs, then. ‘I mean, I probably could have-’

‘We’re going to sleep in the front room,’ Mike says loudly, as Bev draws away from him and pushes his sweaty red hair from her forehead. She looks like shit. She looks like she needs a cigarette, Richie thinks. ‘We’ll lock the doors. Shove anything we can in front of them’.

Bill, still holding Georgie, nods. ‘Let’s d-do it. We can t-try to see if the TV’s w-working’.

They, all of them, stumble into Mike’s house and out of the warm summer air that suddenly feels so cold. The fields around Mike’s house are empty and quiet, and even though they are usually like that it seems so much worse than before. They wait as Bill drives the truck just behind the barn.

Mike’s TV is dusty and hold, and his house is all whites and dark oaks with chipped wood and furniture from the 50′s. He calls his Grandpa’s name once, almost hopefully.

There is no answer.

He sighs, before turning on the TV. They all settles onto sofas and the floor. Richie stays standing. Even though there is a spare seat on the couch beside Ben, Eddie does too.

All that welcomes them is static.

‘Well, that was fucking anti-climactic,’ Richie pipes up after a moments silence.

‘Beep, beep, Richie,’ Stan sighs, situated next to Bill and Georgie. ‘What now, then?’ Richie totally doesn’t miss the way that Stan is pushing down the wrinkles in his shorts with an almost manic precision. 

Mike stands from the couch heavily. ‘Now, we get this place ready. I guess…I guess we’re going to stay here, for now’.

‘Looks like!’ Richie sighs. ‘Are we gonna have to start slaughtering those sheep in the barn? I tell ya, I don’t think I’m made for that farm life, amigo. Richie Tozier is a delicate flower-’

They all ignore him. He doesn’t blame them.

‘We’ve got to assume this is bad, right?’ Ben says instead. They all look around at each other. Stan, Bill and Georgie sit on the smaller and less clean of the couches. Georgie is squished so close to Bill that he might as well be sitting on his lap, and Bill looks at an utter loss as to what to do. He’s staring at the floor, brow furrowed and jaw tight. On the other couch was Ben, Mike and Bev. Bev was biting her painted nails and chewing the side of her mouth at the same time, fuck knows how. Ben was attempting to look calm. Mike looked like he was about to glare a hole through the TV. ‘Like, this is…apocalyptic, or something?’

Richie nudges Eddie in the side as he moves forward. They’re standing behind the larger of the couches, where Bev, Ben and Mike sit. His chucks squeak against Mike’s chipped floorboards. ‘No one gonna say it? Swell’. He sighs. He feels like a dick. ‘It looks to me like it’s the fucking zombie apocalypse, lads and ladies’.

‘Fuck, Rich,’ Eddie hisses, elbowing him in the side. He shoots a look to the wide eyed Georgie. ‘Have some tact!’

‘The sooner we come to terms with it, the better!’ Richie defends, slightly annoyed at how fucking adorable Eddie looks so annoyed. He shouldn’t be thinking about that now. 

‘It wasn’t like you got to see your parents like that!’ Stan snaps suddenly, voice raspy. Richie snaps his mouth shut. He wasn’t exactly foreign to the prospect of Stan snapping at him. Georgie whimpers. Bill sighs. ‘It’s okay for you!’

Richie doesn’t miss a beat as he shrugs, though his stomach twists. His parents were almost certainly dead, but he just didn’t care. There utter disinterest in him seemed to have fucked him up just a little. ‘That’s fair,’ he counters. ‘I didn’t. Only people I care about are in this room’. He coughs as they all turn to look at him, all ashen and all scared looking. Bev’s shoulders sag as she stares at him. Jesus, he hates getting fucking sappy. ‘We’ve gotta come to terms with what’s happening, guys. We’ve gotta survive’.

‘He-he’s right,’ Bill mutters finally. He stands, bringing Georgie with him. ‘We h-have to survive’.

-

They go off into pairs. Ben and Bev. Mike and Stan. Eddie and Richie. Mike directs Bill toward his room upstairs, somewhere the Losers had only been twice before. He says that Georgie can rest on his bed whilst they make the farmhouse somewhat defensive against the Dead. 

Bill thanks Mike, just as Georgie unlatches himself from Bill’s side, stumbles over to Richie, and wraps his arms around Richie’s waist. Georgie was a tall kid, but Richie was a freakishly tall teenager. 

‘Thanks, Rich,’ Georgie mumbles.

Richie has to stop himself from fucking melting, because he really did love the kid. He nods, coughs, and pats the kid on the head before pushing him lightly toward Bill. They all go their separate ways after that. Mike and Stan go to grab any tools that can be used as weapons from the barn, whilst also locking the sheep away. Ben and Bev go to barricade the back door and try to block the windows around the back of the house, whilst Eddie and Richie do the same for the front.

Eddie gives Richie a pointed side-eye as Georgie and Bill wander upstairs, quiet words on Bill’s tongue. Richie blushes red and elbows Eddie in the side. ‘Shut it, Kaspbrak’.

‘You’re my hero, Richie,’ Eddie practically sings, a giggle in his throat. Richie can’t snap at him or shoot back a sassy comeback, because he’s too relieved that Eddie is doing something other than freaking the fuck out or having an asthma attack.

Richie snorts, before pushing the bookcase nearest the living room bay window forward. ‘Help me with this, ya useless sack of-’

‘Beep, beep!’

There’s a moments silence as they grunt, Eddie pulling and Richie pushing the bookcase. A few books fall, but they ignore it. 

With the window covered, Richie sighs and shrugs off his denim jacket, leaving him in his short-sleeved white band tee. Eddie eyes him. Richie grins. That grin soon turns into a stunned, pink cheeked look when Eddie says, quietly, ‘That was really brave what you did; going after Georgie’.

Richie coughs, all nervous, because Eddie is looking at him with that wide eyed look of sincerity that has his stomach doing flips and his mind racing at how fucking beautiful Eddie was. He’s all but forgotten about the Senior guy that Eddie had been making eyes at just that morning (shit, was that only in the morning), because all he can think about is how Eddie is looking at him now. And Richie…Richie is a fucking sucker for anyone being proud of him.

They’re standing in front of the now blacked out window, Richie with his shoulders hunched and Eddie with his fucking pastel jumper and his serious look. ‘Wasn’t gonna let the fuckin’ kid die, was I?’ Richie shrugs, his glasses slipping down his nose. ‘Plus, I’m the fastest, aren’t I? I’m not that much of a dick, Ed’s’.

Eddie frowns even harder. Is it Richie imagination, or did Eddie just take a fucking step forward? ‘I don’t think you’re a dick’. He blinks, tilts his head, before adding, ‘Not all the time, anyway’.

Richie rolls his eyes. ‘Ha fucking ha’.

They stare at each other, before Eddie rolls his eyes and reached forward to pointedly slip Richie’s glasses back up his long nose, his tongue peeking out between his lips. Richie’s stomach almost drops out of his ass as the act. 

Eddie drops his hand. Richie stares. Eddie stares back. Then Eddie is sighing and leaning forward, and Richie’s arms automatically come forward to land on Eddie’s shoulders as Eddie pressed his forehead against Richie’s chest and Richie is going into fucking cardiac arrest, he’s sure of it.

‘What the fuck is even happening, Rich?’ Eddie mutters angrily, and Richie blinks, making sure no one is there as he slowly wraps his arms around Eddie’s warm and solid back. ‘Why the fuck is this even happening?’

Richie shrugs. ‘Fuck knows. Probably some shitty government experiment. I like The Walking Dead, but not so much that I want the shit to be real’.

Eddie snorts. There’s a pause as Richie slowly, almost unsure, rests his chin on top of Eddie’s head. They’ve done this before. Hugged. Been touchy. They’ve always been like that. It might have receded a bit when Richie realised just how much he fucking liked Eddie, but Richie was a touchy person. ‘People are dead, Rich. Our parents…all of them…they’re dead’.

Richie nods, chin jutting against the top of Eddie’s head. It’s pretty fucking terrifying. Hours ago, the scariest thing to all of them was the prospect of going to College alone. Now, it was the end of the world. He pulls Eddie away, mouth twisted into a frown as he holds Eddie at arms length , brown eyes on brown. ‘I know, Ed’s. But we…I mean, my cheesy as shit speech earlier wasn’t just for show. We’ve got each other, right?’

Eddie, who is ashen and sweaty, sags and smiles a little. Richie’s heart leaps. ‘Yeah, I guess. You’re being oddly fucking deep today, Trashmouth’.

Richie shrugs, hands still on Eddie’s shoulders. ‘End of the world got me all poetic and shit, I guess’.

Eddie rolls his eyes. Richie grins. Then…well, it’s like they suddenly look at each other at the exact same moment, and something in the air shifts. Richie had moments in which he’s wanted to kiss Eddie a fuck ton. When they’re drunk. When he’s high. When Eddie is laughing. Pretty much all the time.

But in that moment, with the way in which Eddie’s dark eyes flash down to Richie’s lips, Richie almost thinks that Eddie wants to kiss him, too.

Of course, it’s that moment that Stan decides to fucking scream.

‘Fuck!’ Eddie swears, yanking himself away from Richie. He’s already tearing open the door before Richie can even comprehend what the fuck just happened. Bev and Ben stumbled into the hallway from the kitchen, chests heaving and eyes wide.

‘What the fuck are you doing?!’ Bev yells. ‘Come on, Rich!’

He does.

What they find outside is a fucking terrifying sight. Mike is lying on the floor, scrambling to his feet as Stan attempts to push something off of him. They’re a few feet from the front door.

Eddie is standing there. They all are.

It’s one of them.

One of the Dead.

And it’s on Stan.


	5. Bev The Badass

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so sorry for the cliffhanger for this lmao. also, follow me at floralreddie!

It isn’t entirely shocking that Bev is the first to act.

She hurtles past Eddie, Richie and Ben, even surpassing Mike as she trips past him, her brown boots scraping against the dry dirt as the Dead thing drools over Stan’s face.

Richie stands, stock still and shocked. He doesn’t realise he’s yelling her name until Eddie whirls around to look at him, eyes wide. Ben rushes to Richie’s side, alsy shouting for Bev. 

The girl was already aiming a high kick to the Dead things torso. It’s a man, he thinks. It’s skin is already sagging and grey, and the army clothes that he wears are crusty with blood. 

Army.

Not a good sign.

Sta scrambles back as the Dead lurches from Bev’s kick, it’s attention suddenly on her. Mike grabs Stan’s shoulders and dags him back, as Stan yells and screams. The Dead, now on its new target, clambers to its feet, white eyes solely on Bev.

‘Stay back, everyone!’ Bev yells, and a few birds seems to burst in fright from an acorn tree above them. In the distance, Richie hears a siren wail. ‘It’s distracted, just-’ She’s cut off as it stumbles for her, shoulder first as if it can’t walk straight. Bev kicks at it. 

Richie seems entirely frozen all of a sudden. He feels like a fucking statue, or something. Why isn’t he helping? Why isn’t he making the stupid fucking decision to hurtle forward and save Bev?

‘Richie!’ Mike shouts.

Richie looks. Mike is pointing at something past him, his dark skin shining with sweat in the afternoon sun. Tucked under his arm is Stan, tears on his cheeks and legs shaking. Richie whirls around, and then he sees what Mike was pointing at.

A shovel, propped up on the side of the house by the doorway.

Finally, he acts.

He stumbles to reach for it, heart hammering as he hears another sickening smack of boot against skin as Bev screams a she-woman yell, obviously doing her best to fight off the Dead army soldier. Richie grabs the shovel, turns, and doesn’t even think as he takes one final lurch forward to the scene where Bev circles the drooling Dead.

He throws the shovel with a, ‘Bev!’

It narrowly misses hitting Eddie’s head but he ducks, thank fuck, and Bev the fucking Badass catches it easily with both hands, her bracelets jangling and her red hair shining. Simultaneously, she whirls around, feet spread apart, and smacks the Dead around the head with the shovel.

There’s a sickening crunch. A spray of blood against the green grass. Then, it falls, mouth agape and skull caved in.

There’s a moment of silence as they all stare. Bev drops the shovel to the ground and holds her hands up. Richie stares. They were shaking. 

‘Holy shit’.

Ben stumbles forward, arms open as Bev reaches for him, face ashen and hair a mess. There’s blood splattered across her cheeks and her hands, but Ben disregards all of this as he checks her over, praising her for bing so fucking brave.

Eddie is already between Stan and Mike, hands on Stan’s arms as he checks him up and down. When Richie reaches them, ears still buzzing with shock, he hears Eddie muttering, ‘Bites, bites, bites. I can’t see any, Stan. I think you’re okay’.

When he sees the scrapes on Stan’s knees, Richie says, almost dazed, ‘Times like this I wish you still had your fanny pack, Ed’s. Thing was a fucking compact hospital’.

Mike groans. ‘Damn. Those things are already making their way out of towns. You see that? The army can’t even hold this shit off-’

Bev pulls away from Ben to look over at them. ‘We need to get inside,’ she says. ‘Now’.

-

Stan goes to shower before Bev. He stands, for a moment, shaking in the hallway with his eyes trained in horror at his suddenly dirty fingernails and the scratches on his knees. He’s pale and peaky, and Mike drags him away by the crook of his elbow and says that he has spare clothes for Stan.

They all know full well that Stan didn’t like to be dirty. He didn’t like to be out of control. 

‘Fuck,’ Richie swears, scooping Beverly into hug as they all stand in the hallway of the Hanlon Farmhouse. He kisses her red hair and squeezes her hard. ‘Christ on a fucking bike, Marsh. You freaking machine’.

She pulls away with a pale faced smile, her lips a stark red against her skin. ‘You’ve got red on you now, Trashmouth’.

Richie looks. He has blood against his denim jacket. He wonders, for a second, why Bev couldn’t bring herself to say blood. The others, Eddie, Ben and Bill, are sitting around the living room. Mike and Stan are upstairs, and Richie hears the shower start and knows that Stan must be cleaning himself. Georgie, according to the startled Bill when they stumbled into the house, had managed to fall asleep.

‘You did what you had to do, y’know,’ Richie assures her, as he lets go of the girl. Bev cocks a brow at him.

‘I know,’ she answers. 

‘We stay inside now,’ Bill voices, turning away from his low conversation with Eddie and Ben. ‘If we go outside, we go in pairs. We need to lock up, it’s already six’. With a quick glance to the clock above the fireplace, Richie sees that Bill was right.

‘Dinner,’ Eddie says suddenly, standing so fast from the sofa that Ben jumps. ‘We should make dinner. I’ll-I’ll go-’ He darts into the kitchen so quickly that Bev turns back to the three boys with a bemused look on her face.

Richie sighs. ‘I’ll go,’ he mutters. The rooms was dark, save only for the lamp they had decided to keep lit. All the downstairs windows were blocked by dressers and bookshelves. ‘Go shower, Marsh. Ed’s and I will get some grub ready’.

Not that Richie knew how to cook, unless you counted spooning Nutella onto bread ‘cooking’.

Eddie is standing against the counter when Richie wanders into the kitchen, his shoes kicked off and his socked feet cold against the stone flooring. The window in the kitchen was blocked by some newspaper, courtesy of Bev and Ben, and the back door locked with a chain. 

Richie stares at him when he enters. Eddie’s arms are crossed, and his jaw is tight like it always gets when he’s thinking hard. They lock eyes, quiet and stoic, before Richie sighs and shrugs. 

‘Shall we make spaghetti, Spaghetti?’

Eddie makes a tutting sound and grimaces so massively that Richie has to snort. ‘You’re not fucking funny,’ Eddie snaps, uncrossing his arms and planting them at his side, fists clenched. His cheeks flush pink. ‘You think you’re so fucking funny, Richie. Even when the world is fucking ending, you still have to crack your shitty fucking jokes and take the piss out of me, don’t you? I don’t fucking-’

‘Woah, shit, Ed’s-’ Richie jumps in, not exactly startled by Eddie’s words. He has, admittedly, received far more venomous words from his best friend. The fact, though, that Eddie’s eyes were very quickly filling with tears was what was startling Richie.

Jesus, he could be an asshole sometimes.

‘No!’ Eddie snaps, and his voice cracks. He wipes a clenched fist against his cheek angrily, catching a stray tear. ‘Shit, I’m not fucking crying because of you, dickweed! Cant you just - can’t you just not be a dick for ten fucking seconds, Richie! Ma’s dead, and-’

Eddie swallows, stutters, and then buries his head in his hands and starts sobbing.

Richie stares and watches his best friend, his fucking long-term crush, cry a good thirty seconds before he actually does something. 

He kicks the kitchen door shut with his socked foot before padding clumsily across the kitchen floor, his cheeks red and his mouth agape. He mutters something, probably an awkward apology, and wraps his lanky arms around Eddie’s shoulders.

Eddie crashes into him, arms looping around Richie’s waist as he sobs. It’s a wet, loud and horrible sound, and Richie hopes the fuck he never hears it come from Eddie ever again. He feels the wet warmth of Eddie’s tears seep through his band shirt, and Eddie heaves and whimpers and chokes on his breath and Richie rubs his back, wide eyes planted on the wall over Eddie’s head.

He drags Eddie as close as he can, because he doesn’t know what else to fucking do. He knows that Bill had disappeared upstairs again to be with Georgie. He knows that Ben and Bev were in the living room. He knows that Stan was still in the shower, and that Mike was somewhere in the house. He knows they’re probably all having a moment to cry, too.

He knows his parents are dead. He knows his friends are all he has left. He knows he’s not going to Cali for College, anymore. He knows the world is ending. He knows he’s eighteen and fucking terrified and it’s just him and his friends and an eleven year old boy they’re now responsible for.

It’s only when Eddie pulls away from Richie’s chest, eyes red and wet and wide, and stares at Richie in something akin to wonder and horror that Richie realises he’s crying, too.

‘Holy shit, Rich. Are you crying?’

And, holy fuck, he is.

He shrugs and shakes his head, arms still wrapped around Eddie, and chokes on a laugh as tears rush down his cheeks, and his chest feels so tight he’s scared it might burst. 

Eddie’s hair is a mess and his wide brown eyes are bloodshot from tears and his chest is stiff heaving with sobs, but he still reaches up to slide his thumbs underneath Richie’s glasses and wipes the wet skin underneath Richie’s eyelids. Eddie stares at him. Richie knows why. He hasn’t cried in fucking ages. He didn’t even cry when his mom drank, anymore.

And then Eddie stands on his tiptoes, breathing hard, and kisses away the wetness of Richie’s freckled cheeks. It’s so soft Richie is half-scared he might have imagined it.

Richie freezes, face damp and breath shuddering.

Eddie pulls away, brown eyes almost black and lips parted and wet with Richie’s tears. Richie stares, heart hammering and feeling so fucking large in his chest, and Eddie draws his arms around Richie’s neck.

Richie feels his glasses sliding down is nose as he ducks his head, curls falling across his face as he moves his mouth closer to Eddie’s, and-

And then there is a screaming, roaring sound like a thousand car engines were starting and failing at the same time. The ground shakes. The walls quake. It sounds like the world is being torn about around them, and Richie hears Ben shout, and Eddie holds him, hands suddenly looping around Richie’s neck as he drags Richie to the ground, swears and shout on his tongue.

There is a roar. There is an Earth shattering shake. There is the sound of something crashing and burning and it is as if Hell was tearing open around them.

And all Richie can do his grab Eddie face as the two of them crouch on the ground in the Mike’s kitchen, and make sure that the last thing he ever sees is Eddie Kaspbrak’s watery brown eyes.


End file.
